COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

Monday, October 12, 2015

QUESTION NO. (19)

QUESTION: Councillor C. O'Connor

To ask the Chief Executive to present an update on plans for the development of the excellent Mobile Library Service in our County?

REPLY:

South Dublin Libraries offer a Mobile Library Service to communities in South Dublin who find it difficult to access our static service points. These communities include schools, early start facilities, nursing homes and geographically remote areas.  

The Mobile Libraries visit more than 60 scheduled public stops throughout the County. These include:

• 49 public stop locations   -   mostly every week.
• 19 primary schools visited from September to June:
• Book deliveries to Crèches, Community Centres and a Nursing Home.

All our vehicles now use mobile broadband technologies, giving full access to Internet for the staff and our customers.

South Dublin Mobile Library service operates with 3 full sized mobile libraries on a daily basis. The service can be seen on our county roads morning, afternoons and evenings until after 8pm. The oldest vehicle is 20 years old and although kept in perfect mechanical condition it has almost reached the end of its working life. We are pleased to let you know that we are having a new mobile library build at this time and expect to have it on the roads early in 2016.

Despite the limitations imposed by the size of the mobile library, staff have embraced the implementation of literacy supports and other outreach activities. The Summer Reading Challenge, Summer Buzz, runs very successfully and this year in excess of 100 children took part. A Summer Events Programme runs in conjunction with this with Storytime every week in Corkagh Park, Lego Workshops at 2 locations, and a number of visits to DOE run Summer Camps in Deis schools. 

Mobile library staff also coordinate Children’s Book Festival, Red Line Book Festival, and Science Festival events in local schools and hope to expand the work undertaken with schools to support literacy initiatives. The Classroom Readers Collection development is managed and delivered using the Mobile Library Service. In addition we are supporting Early Start literacy initiatives through service to crèches and Early Start Units in Deis schools.

As part of our Age Friendly strategy we will continue to deliver a mobile library service to the homebound and to nursing homes. Summer 2015 saw the introduction of a scheduled service to Bloomfield Health Care facility. Staff from South Dublin Mobile Service worked in partnership with the Occupational Therapy staff in Bloomfield on a pilot scheme which involved regular visits to the facility during the summer months.

The Mobile Library is now a regular feature at Rathfarnham Village Festival and at Tallafest. These events afford us an opportunity to showcase the services of the Mobile Library and to engage with future potential partners in the community.